See first chapter for warnings. This chapter appearing here, astonishingly, almost immediately after AO3 – also immediately after the Days 22-27 was posted here, so if you haven't read that, go back a chapter.
Kotetsu Isane
Isane agreed with the decision to replace the yokes within Fourth Division, where healers could be standing by. They'd seen the effects of yoke removal on civilians, and they'd been ugly. If the location hadn't been dictated from on high, she would have asked Gantenbainne to at least try to get Dordoni to bring his servant in.
She just felt the whole thing could have been arranged in a much less insane way. Perhaps starting with not having all the yoke-holding arrancar in Fourth at the same time, that would probably help a lot.
(Baraggan would probably still be blocking traffic with that damned throne, though. She was really starting to hate that throne.)
As it was, she was… busy. First with tending to Ise Nobume and Nariko; their yoke injuries weren't too bad, but there were plenty of other things to take care of. Improving the yoke wasn't likely to make things much better for them. Nariko was stubborn and sardonic; Nobume was just brittle.
Isane wanted to at least assure them that Noriyo and Katae were doing well under Hinamori's care, but she wasn't sure it was her place, and was even less sure she should mention the children with Nnoitra's fraccion in the room. Nnoitra himself was absent, which was a small relief, until she considered that he couldn't have gone far (since he couldn't delegate the re-yoking) and what else he might be getting into in the meantime.
She should probably figure out what he was doing. She couldn't do much besides send a hell butterfly to Tōsen asking him to step in, but she had to at least do that. And she also needed to make sure everything else was under control.
"You don't need to wait for a check-up after the new yoke has been applied before you leave," she said, half to Nariko and half to the fraccion. "But come in tomorrow morning to make sure everything's as expected."
"I'll tell Nnoitra-sama," the fraccion said. "When he… gets back."
Did he not know where Nnoitra was, either? Nothing she could do about it either way.
Check the first of the rest of the examining rooms given over to the yoke transition — Sasakibe was still empty-eyed, but the yoke hadn't left any real injuries, and he'd been cleared and re-yoked. Therefore, Zommari could have taken him and left. However, he had not. Shinigami were advised not to attempt to talk to Zommari unnecessarily, so she left that for the moment. Hopefully Zommari would bring Sasakibe in for a checkup in the morning, but even if he didn't Sasakibe should be all right for however long it took for Tōsen to order Zommari in line.
Second room — Iemura trying to stabilize Nasu Rokurō and Dordoni trying to flirt with a nurse. No surprises there. (Gantenbainne had assured her that Dordoni wouldn't take a turndown badly, at least not from a stranger trying to work, so she just made sure everyone who had to deal with Dordoni was a seasoned veteran of dealing with Kyōraku.) Iemura had that in hand, so she moved on.
Third examining room — Ogidō cleaning up. He looked up at her sheepishly. "Sorry, vice-captain — I know you wanted to check on all the cases, but the Cuatro seemed to be in a hurry, the yoke injuries weren't bad, and there weren't any injuries besides the yoke injuries…"
She couldn't really reprimand him for not wanting to argue with Ulquiorra. Ulquiorra managed to be far more terrifying than Nnoitra despite never having actually done anything where they could see it. "Write everything up and have it on my desk by this evening." She could at least be confident that Ulquiorra would have his… charges back for the checkup.
Fourth examining room — Rukia holding a gauze pad to the worst of the cuts on her shoulders, and Hanatarō working on Ichigo, who was in much better condition than the civilian despite his loss of powers. But then, the yoke's effects on him had been getting less severe as time passed. She guessed Grimmjow was right about Ichigo being able to get his powers back?
…Speaking of whom, Grimmjow was not in the room. His fraccion Shawlong was, frowning at an old copy of the Seireitei Communication, but no Sexta.
…Hopefully he wasn't off picking a fight with Nnoitra.
…At least not inside the Emergency Relief Station. That wasn't too much to ask for, was it?
"Is everything okay in here?" she asked, instead of asking about Grimmjow specifically.
"I'm almost done with Ichigo-san, and then Rukia-san shouldn't take long," Hanatarō reported. "I took care of all the other injuries before Grimmjow-san took the yokes off." He paused, and blinked, evidently noticing Grimmjow's absence.
"He's looking into something," Shawlong said.
Hopefully not into picking a fight with Nnoitra. "Well, let me know if you need anything."
Shawlong just frowned harder at the magazine. She hoped he didn't ask her to explain anything. Was that the issue with the haiku competition?
"Did Ulquiorra go by a minute ago?" Ichigo asked. "What was he doing here?"
"He holds the yoke on some Academy personnel," Isane said, a little surprised. "I don't think he does much with them besides enforce orders."
"…Oh." Ichigo subsided into glaring at nothing in particular.
"Mass check-up on the new yoke is tomorrow morning," she reminded them, and moved on.
The fifth room was currently inaccessible through the main door because of the throne. Rather than try to squeeze past Baraggan, the medical team had knocked a door through the back of a supply closet. Isane made her way past the shelves of bandages and tonics to find her Sixth Seat standing by awkwardly, and Kira, Yumichika, and Ōmaeda still in the original yokes. Yumichika and Chuhlhourne were sniping at each other, but otherwise Isane didn't see any reason for the delay.
"Is… something the matter?" she asked after a moment.
"Not that I know of?" the Sixth Seat said. "I've said we can get started any time…"
Kira cleared his throat, and shot a glance at the fraccion standing around. "I think Baraggan-sama is… observing the other Espada who are here, and doesn't want to… miss any observation opportunities."
Ah. Arrancar politics, then. Isane wondered if he knew where Nnoitra and Grimmjow had wandered off too, but she could hardly ask. "I see. I… understand that Tōsen-sama is expecting all of this to be done by the end of the day, so…"
"We'll remind them," Yumichika said.
"And then there's supposed to be a check-up tomorrow…"
Kira nodded understanding. "We'll be here." At least with all three of them active shinigami, they didn't have to worry about being let out or escorted.
Sixth room — Utsunomiya Tomomoto by himself, new yoke in place, all healed up. Isane blinked. "Where's Sanderwicci-san?"
Utsunomiya winced. "I think, um, I think Cirucci-sama went to, um. Check on Sasakibe-san. I'm supposed to wait for her."
At least Cirucci had the self-preservation instinct not to start a fight with Zommari, in the Emergency Relief Station or otherwise. Isane was mostly sure she did, at least. "Please remember to come in again tomorrow to make sure the new yoke is as undamaging as intended?"
"Yes, Kotetsu-fukutaichō."
Strange, now that she thought about it. The Privaron Espada seemed relatively rational, and so did the top four Espada — heart-freezingly terrifying, but rational. It was the middle bunch that were varying degrees of off-the-wall insane.
Speaking of which… Kurotsuchi Nemu had been assigned to the seventh room, so Szayelaporro should be in there, too. Isane had heard more than she'd seen of the Octava, but she'd heard plenty, so she'd asked for a volunteer to check Nemu over rather than order anyone to risk themselves. Happily, her Fourth Seat looked intact, as did Nemu. (Not that the last was a surprise. Nemu was frighteningly resilient.)
"Szayelaporro-sama has stepped out to look in on Twelfth," Nemu said. Then, still placidly, "Do you know what progress Akon has made in reassigning superfluous personnel?"
Away from possible lab specimen status. …Or additional lab specimen status. "There were enough losses in other divisions that all the non-SRDI officers could be absorbed immediately." Fourth had grabbed a few younger researchers, too, who could at least pass for medical techs.
Nemu nodded. "Good. Szayelaporro-sama believes he will only be required to search Las Noches for four more days, and then he can be based in Seireitei."
That… was not good news. Hanatarō would be distraught. But Isane just nodded, and instructed Nemu to come in to have the replacement yoke checked when she could, if not tomorrow, or immediately if symptoms worsened.
And now… there were not as many rooms left as she was expecting, and not as many people in the room there was as she was expecting. "Where's Yadōmaru-san?" she asked.
Mashiro pouted. "She had to go do additional yoke testing up the hill and she's not back yet."
That was… concerning. Isane glanced quickly at the Tercera, who was standing with arms folded, unreadable behind her high collar. No hints there. But the one fraccion in attendance — the dark one, Mila Rose — was scowling almost as hard as Hiyori.
As was usual, the Visored had only superficial yoke injuries, easily treated. Isane saw to them quickly, avoiding Hiyori's constant glower, before stepping back. "You can apply the new yoke now, Tercera-san."
The Tercera nodded briefly, and manifested one of the new yokes in her hand. Mashiro winced dramatically in anticipation, and quite genuinely on application, but held still without prompting. Hiyori got a hand on her shoulder to restrain what looked like a fierce, if brief, struggle. (The Espada were so strong.) Both yokes went on cleanly, with no blood spilled.
"Please come in tomorrow to make sure everything is as expected," Isane said, and avoided Hiyori's eyes harder after she caught a glimpse of the blame in them.
"Mashiro and Hiyori will be here tomorrow," the Tercera said, moving towards the door. "I will bring Lisa… as soon as possible. Come."
Mashiro and Hiyori followed immediately, perforce, but Mila Rose paused on her way after them. "Oh, and they called Hachigen up there, too. I'm sure Starrk forgot to inform you, or maybe tried to send Lilynette with a message, and she wandered off."
That explained that. "Ah, yes. Thank you, Mila Rose-san."
The fraccion just waved over her shoulder, and sauntered out.
A sudden dramatic flare of reiatsu abruptly revealed the locations of both Nnoitra and Grimmjow — mercifully, just outside the gates of Fourth Division. Isane decided that was just going to have to be someone else's problem.
Yadōmaru Lisa
The order that Lisa accompany Hachi to the castle for yoke testing was extremely unwelcome. Alarming, in fact. And it would have been alarming even before she saw what a stay in the castle had done to Sasakibe, but after…
She had never liked Sasakibe all that much, even before exile. She'd respected him, of course, but she wasn't particularly fond of tea ceremonies, English tea non-ceremonies, other tea-centered activities, or total adulation of one's leaders. They didn't have much in common. And then after the whole fiasco, he was just one of the most slavish devotees of the system which condemned them.
Seeing him like that was still profoundly unnerving. Frightening. In the field it was even worse. For a more than competent officer to just stand and stare blankly while Hollows were attacking—
She'd almost left it too late to intervene. Zommari was supposed to order Sasakibe to fight, but he just stood and glowered. The Seventh Division officers hadn't seemed to know what to do — they wanted to rely on Sasakibe, they were supposed to be relying on Sasakibe, they clearly could not rely on Sasakibe—
Lisa had jumped in before anyone could be killed, but there were some injuries which could have been avoided if she'd moved earlier, or if Zommari had done his damn job.
Cirucci, according to Hiyori, had done a much better job the following day. (Not that Hiyori put it that way.) There was a lot of unnecessary whip-cracking, but the Hollows got purified.
The point was, whatever they were doing in the castle had all but destroyed a shinigami older and stronger than Lisa, and she wasn't eager to see it firsthand.
Hachi was more or less fine, but Hachi hadn't given Hinamori a way out of the corner Aizen had backed her into.
At least, he hadn't before. Shit.
Harribel being twitchy about the whole thing didn't make Lisa any less worried, either. She didn't trust the Espada, exactly, but… well, she trusted Harribel to want them more or less intact. So she sort of trusted her. Shit. She hadn't planned on that. Was this what they called Stockholm Syndrome? Fuck.
Hinamori had escorted them up the long stairs in the not-Senzaikyū. She kept trying to smile, but it was a dismal failure. It was not reassuring.
Aizen's throne room was… she had just decided on 'stupid-looking' as the best description when Aizen appeared and his reiatsu knocked both her and Hachi to their knees.
The reiatsu subsided a bit, enough that they could see him smiling. "I've called you here to test some of the new yoke designs I asked you for, Hachigen-kun."
Hachi blanched. Hinamori blanched more.
Hachi already had the new yoke on. Lisa had nothing.
Shit.
This was going to suck.
Kira Izuru
The morning yoke check-ups had been down to a more or less smooth routine, but the morning of the new yoke inspections most certainly was not. It wasn't quite as bad as the previous day's chaos when everyone was supposed to be getting the yokes replaced — Baraggan hadn't come, which improved things already — but it was still everyone at once, with inconveniently many arrancar running around. And then, just in case Fourth Division hadn't felt busy enough, Hisagi and a squad from Ninth came back from fighting an oddly-powered group of Huge Hollows with a variety of interesting injuries.
Which wasn't to say they didn't also have some interesting injuries from Baraggan and fraccion testing for themselves that the new design of the yoke was equally effective, but it was nothing life-threatening.
"They're not going to get to us any time soon unless we push for it," Yumichika said, reclining on an exam table. Clearly he wasn't planning to, despite how much he'd limped coming in and how much he'd complained about the ugliness of broken fingers the night before. Ōmaeda had dropped into a chair and didn't look like he'd be moving anytime soon. The pain wasn't enough to make Kira try to put himself forward, either, when there were actual combat casualties around. Third wasn't going out today, so Kira didn't need to be done quickly.
And he didn't have any arrancar there to insist he get seen to immediately — one of Grimmjow's fraccion towed a badly limping and bruised Kurosaki Ichigo up to a Fourth Division officer and started gesturing impatiently, until they were ushered back.
Kuchiki Rukia was slightly less bruised, slightly less limping, and turned loose upon arrival. She shuffled over and leaned on another table. "Yours insist on testing the new yoke, too?" she asked tiredly.
"Some people can't take anything on faith," Yumichika sniffed.
"I wouldn't describe Baraggan-sama or his fraccion as ours," Kira murmured. "But yes. No yoke injuries for any of us. You? And Kurosaki, I know without his powers…"
"He's been seeing some real improvement there, actually—"
She was interrupted by the small, unpleasant Visored stomping up and grabbing her elbow. "What is that blue-haired asshole doing to Ichigo?" Sarugaki demanded. Clearly she wasn't injured at all.
Rukia gave her a measuring look. "Most relevantly, having him fight a lot."
"What do you think he's doing to him?" Yumichika said. "The same thing that's getting done to all the rest of us. Except you, because Yadōmaru took the fall for all three of you."
Kira winced. That was accurate, but cruel.
"I see Mashiro, but where is Lisa-san?" Rukia asked. "And Hachi-san?"
Sarugaki scowled even harder. "They both got summoned to the castle yesterday. Some sort of final test of the revised yoke, or something, and no, I have no fucking idea why they wanted Lisa for that."
"That's… worrying."
"No shit." Sarugaki crossed her arms and lowered her voice. "I think Harribel-sama was expecting her back by now, too, and she's not happy about it. I think she's gone to see what's going on. She told the fraccion to escort us here, and we're not supposed to leave without them, like they're supposed to be protecting us or something."
Kira noted, not for the first time, that the Tercera seemed to have a very different attitude towards her pets than Baraggan did. But then he guessed all the Espada — all the arrancar — were different.
Which reminded him— "I think I saw Ulquiorra with Zommari — does anyone know what he was doing here? I didn't know he had — had pets."
"According to Grimmjow-sama, he doesn't, exactly. He was assigned to hold the yokes of some senior Academy faculty." Rukia's mouth twitched. "He said that's what Ulquiorra got for being loyal and boring."
"Oh, that makes sense." At least Ulquiorra, unlike Zommari, was hopefully unlikely to alter the curriculum to remove all mention of purifying Hollows… Kira frowned. "What about the Kidō Corps?"
Ōmaeda spoke for the first time. "Apparently the Kidō Corps was already heavily suborned — Suì-Fēng-taichō was trying to root that out, but never had time to finish — and most of the rest are… apolitical."
That was more than a little unnerving when you considered how much Seireitei depended on the Kido Corps, but Kira decided not to pursue it. "I wonder if they're going to let more arrancar have pets now that the yoke is less likely kill them?"
"The fraccion want a new one now that I'm off limits most nights," Rukia said with a grimace.
"The Sexta asked if I had any shinigami sisters," Sixteenth Seat Utsunomiya said, looking beleaguered. When had he slunk up?
"Do you?" Yumichika asked.
"No."
"Hopefully they'll pull new pets from the nobles or the retainers," Mashiro said. "So no one else will have to dress up like this." She tried to rest her chin on Hiyori's head and was violently elbowed off.
"That seems… extreme," Kira said.
"It's easy for you," Mashiro said, pouting. "You're a current vice-captain, everyone knows who you are and knows you're yoked, and if they don't know who you are they see the badge and then they know. Every time I meet a new person I have to take my shirt off to prove I didn't sell my soul to Aizen-sama."
"No, you really don't," Hiyori said.
Mashiro ignored her. "And now that it's not leaving bloodstains on the collar it'll be even worse!"
"People are getting to know you quickly enough," Rukia pointed out.
"Only partially because she takes her shirt off as an introduction," Yumichika added in an undertone.
"There are only three of you and you're everywhere, backing people up. I expect most of us assigned to a single squad are still mistaken for sworn shinigami by everyone else."
Utsunomiya nodded glumly. "People keep being scared of me. Especially in Fourth."
"If Sanderwicci keeps whipping your ass so you keep coming in every morning, eventually you'll know everyone in Fourth. Problem solved," Hiyori said. Utsunomiya turned red.
"It's a shame there isn't a specific yoke uniform," Yumichika sighed. "Maybe something a little more flattering."
Ōmaeda snorted. "Maybe a big orange cloth yoke thing?"
"Excuse me?"
The rest of the group collectively, palpably decided not to get involved in a style argument between Ōmaeda and Yumichika. Good call. Kira considered telling them how lucky they were Chuhlhourne wasn't around to jump in.
"I bet Ishida could come up with something good," Rukia said glumly. "Although it might have crosses in the lining. And we'd have to veto any capes."
"Sorry, who?" Kira asked.
"Ishida Uryū. From Karakura. He was in the handicrafts club and sewed all his own uniforms — he's a Quincy, I don't think he could get them anywhere else. He's really fast, too. He made the most elaborate doll costumes in minutes. He'd probably be able to whip up something which said 'not in any way a voluntary convert but nonetheless entrusted with a weapon'. Or… whatever we need it to say."
She was talking about him like he was alive, but — no, the Quincy had been in Hueco Mundo, not the town. "Where is he now?"
"Twelfth," she said, even more glumly. "Waiting for Szayelaporro to get back from… whatever the hell he's been doing trying to catch Kurotsuchi. Except they're about ready to give up on that — a few more days, Yylfordt says. At which point… I'm guessing he's not supposed to kill Ishida or Sado? Maybe? But even under Kurotsuchi there was a lot of stuff that didn't rule out…"
"Well, that sounds like a waste," Sung-Sun said from the doorway. "Hiyori, Mashiro, time to go."
"We still need to get checked to make sure—"
"Time to get checked and then go, then. You're not hurt, it shouldn't take long, and there are too many people in here."
As the two Visored were hustled away by the fraccion, Yumichika shook his head. "I really do not understand them."
Shihōin Yoruichi
Back in the bunker again, Yoruichi discarded her latest disguise gigai with a little more care — it actually wasn't a bad fit, and even if she didn't go out again as this particular foreign tourist, it could still be modified for reuse. She would have preferred to go out as a cat, but Tessai and Unohana both insisted it was too much of a risk. (Obviously Aizen knew she could turn into a cat, the idea was it would be too much trouble to observe every single black cat in Japan.) As it was, she'd played "oblivious spiritually-blind human" to wander right up to a couple of shinigami and listen to them while pretending to puzzle over a map.
It sounded like Tessai was in the kitchen with Jinta and Ururu, so she headed for the monitor room.
(She was avoiding Jinta to minimize drama, not because she felt guilty. There was nothing to feel guilty about. If it had been safe to get Kisuke they would have gotten him, and it had been more Unohana's call than hers, anyway. This was just minimizing drama, and not wanting to deal with bratty children. Bratty child. Ururu was all right.)
"Yoruichi-san, I'm glad you're back safely." Unohana was watching Fourth Division again. It looked busy. "Is there any news?"
"Not much we haven't already worked out," Yoruichi replied. "Listened in on a couple of unseated officers gossiping. Sounds like Sasakibe is at least as bad off as he looks, which has everyone even more worried about the other people with bankai who are still up in the castle." Understandably. She had faith in Kisuke to be more durable than Sasakibe, but Aizen was also more likely to be interested in him. "Oh, but they also talked about the 'sworn shinigami' a little — some of them are causing problems, abusing their positions."
Unohana nodded, unsurprised — then her eyes narrowed dangerously. "I wonder if that has anything to do with why so many of my division members are going out in pairs."
Yoruichi shrugged. "It could be, but there are all those arrancar around, too. Also, to become a sworn shinigami, there's some sort of test. No one is allowed to discuss it, but it's rumored to be difficult, and those who don't pass it don't come back."
"…Interesting." Unohana eyed the one sworn shinigami in view on the monitors. "I suppose we're not likely to find out more without getting some intelligence from inside the castle — or interviewing a sworn shinigami."
"Hmm. I haven't seen any in the world of the living." Yoruichi also looked at the sole visible example. "They seem to mostly be working in the Rukongai."
"Because that's where the worst Hollows are, and the world of the living can be handled by unseated officers without shikai," Unohana agreed. "But if there were to be a more serious Hollow outbreak in the world of the living… they would have to send someone more powerful. Either a sworn shinigami, or someone with a yoke."
"Which could provide other… opportunities." Yoruichi considered. "They might send weak shinigami with arrancar backup, but…"
"That might also provide opportunities, if the arrancar could be… plausibly overwhelmed." Unohana's smile was sharper than usual.
Yoruichi smiled back. "So it might."
"Can you ask your Quincy acquaintance for Hollow bait?" Unohana asked.
"Or Tessai might be able to whip something up." Hmm. "We'll have to pick a good spot. Somewhere it's plausible for Hollows to show up, but also somewhere it wouldn't be catastrophic if Seireitei dropped the ball on dealing with it, because we couldn't interfere without breaking cover. And Tessai might have good arguments against it. But… I think it's a plan."
Damn it felt good to have a plan.
"In the meantime, though, what's going on in Fourth? Hang on, is that Ichigo?" He was just leaving, escorted by Shawlong, so Yoruichi quickly brought up the view of the street just outside the Emergency Relief Station on another monitor. Ichigo was gesticulating and trying to yank his arm out of Shawlong's grip. He looked healthy, which wasn't surprising for leaving Fourth, but it was noteworthy that the skin of his neck around the yoke didn't look irritated at all.
"The new design of the yoke seems to be much less damaging," Unohana said.
"Good." Hopefully it wasn't more effective to go with it. "Wonder what Ichigo's arguing about — wish we could get more reliable sound on these things—" She broke off as the green-haired Primera girl — Lilynette, she thought — ran on screen and grabbed Ichigo by the front of his yukata. "Hello." Now she really wished they were getting sound.
Ichigo responded to whatever the girl said to him — the angle wasn't very good for lip-reading, but Yoruichi thought she made out a 'why the hell are you asking me'. Shawlong looked like he wanted to pry the girl off his charge but didn't quite dare touch her. Then he looked up and briefly looked openly dismayed before his expression smoothed out and the Tercera's fraccion ambled on screen, trailing a scowling Hiyori.
"I am forced to admit I find some enjoyment in watching lower-ranked male arrancar deal with those three," Unohana said.
"I'll admit it happily," Yoruichi grinned.
She did wonder what the hell the conversation was about, though.
Ishida Uryū
Szayelaporro only had to search for Kurotsuchi for three more days, then he'd be in Seireitei — in Twelfth Division — indefinitely. Sado had stepped up his attempts to get them out somehow, but Uryū was… not accepting, exactly… not at peace, but… He was going to meet his fate with dignity.
(Sado had described him to Hanatarō as being "too tired to fight", which was not true. It was about dignity.)
He'd never admit it, but it helped that he was pretty sure that nonstop attention from Szayelaporro would kill him in a week or less. He didn't dare try to console Sado with that, though. It wouldn't be a consolation for him, it would be Uryū leaving him alone in Twelfth. He did feel bad about that, but not enough to want to endure Szayelaporro indefinitely. Maybe they'd be able to get Sado out, since the Espada wasn't so interested in him.
He'd have to make sure Kurosaki knew it wasn't his fault. Maybe a letter?
Uryū was lying on his cot, contemplating what he'd write to Ryūken if he had the opportunity, when a commotion started outside somewhere.
"We had three more days—" Sado started, and then the outer door blew in and one of Szayelaporro's fraccion hit the bars and slid to the floor.
Uryū made the effort to sit up. This looked like it might be different.
"That's them, are you happy now?"
A whole crowd of people spilled into the room. Several unfamiliar female arrancar seemed to be in charge. One of them was holding Akon by the lab coat. Another of Szayelaporro's fraccion was flailing ineffectively at the arrancar in the lead.
"I warned you," the arrancar said. "Hiyori-chan, you can take this one."
"Hiyori-chan" was a short blond — not exactly a shinigami, from her reiatsu, more like what Kurosaki was — a Visored, they were called — with a hideous scowl on her face. Probably due to being called "Hiyori-chan". But her obvious displeasure didn't stop her from slamming the fraccion across the room into the bars like the first one.
…A Visored, but with a weird… thing stuck to her, a tangle of shinigami and Hollow power with tendrils all through her. It was anchored at her neck. That, Uryū supposed, would be the yoke.
One of the female arrancar giggled into her sleeve. "And the next one goes to Lilynette! So you might want to back off." She turned to Uryū. "You're the Quincy, aren't you?"
Some questions he might refuse to answer, but never that. "I am."
"And you were the star of the… 'Handicrafts Club'?"
Uryū blinked. "I — what?"
A small arrancar with half a helmet bounced forward. "You can sew and shit really good, right?"
This still made no sense, but fine. He would not be ashamed of his skills. "I can."
The arrancar holding Akon tossed her hair. "Fine. We'll take him. Open the cage."
Akon winced. "Szayelaporro-sama—"
"Isn't here, and Harribel-sama outranks him, so we outrank his flunkies, so hand over the tailor."
"And I'm half the Primera!" said the little girl arrancar, and punched Akon in the groin.
Uryū adjusted his glasses. "May I ask what's going on?" he asked the Visored.
She sneered at him, then scowled harder and scratched at her shoulder. "They heard the Kuchiki girl talking about your amazing uniform-making skills, and Sung-Sun-sama decided she absolutely had to have a personal tailor. The other two are coming along to stick it to Szayelaporro, and I don't know what Lilynette's interest is."
"I want a new uniform design too!" the little girl said.
Personal tailor. To an arrancar.
Who wasn't a scientist, outside Twelfth. This wasn't even a question, even if they'd really been asking. "If you want me to work on many projects, some assistance would make things faster. You should take Sado, too." Sado made an affirming noise, which might mean he agreed he could be of assistance but probably meant he agreed any way out of Twelfth was worth pursuing. Sado wasn't stupid. Uryū could show him enough of the basics to help somehow.
"We'll take that one, too," the arrancar said to Akon. "You better cooperate, unless you want to end up like the fraccion."
Akon didn't look entirely convinced. "That's not going to be a good enough excuse for—" He broke off. "A living world craftsman uses… a lot of equipment, doesn't he? Things that aren't common in Soul Society."
"I can manage without, but yes," Uryū said cautiously.
Akon looked between the arrancar and the Visored. "You could take some additional personnel to… build sewing machines. Synthesize fabric. Whatever you need. That would be helpful, wouldn't it?"
Somewhere out of Twelfth, Uryū understood. Away from Szayelaporro and his edible fraccion. As much as he loathed Twelfth Division, Akon hadn't made things any harder than they had to be. "…Well, maybe if they're young and flexible enough. And not too focused on… biology things." No one who experimented on Quincy, he hoped was understood.
"Oh, yes, we have some very creative workers in sensor, communications, and computations." Akon craned his neck to look at the arrancar holding him. "If that's acceptable to you?"
The arrancar holding him shrugged, as did the one with her sleeve over her face, but the third one and the little girl seemed delighted with the idea of "stealing more from Szayelaporro". The Visored glowered at everyone indiscriminately.
So Akon opened the gate, and then ran off to find a half-dozen young, non-Quincy-dissecting researchers to save from Szayelaporro. Uryū limped out leaning heavily on Sado. They went a different way, not towards the labs.
(Remembering the mind games in Las Noches, he didn't relax.)
"So you really used to work here?" the third arrancar asked the Visored. "It's a pit."
"Tell me about it," the Visored snapped back. "It used to be normal. All this research shit is all Urahara's fault." She glared around. "Though it looks like Kurotsuchi made things about a million times worse, surprising nobody."
"Can he really turn into liquid?"
"The fuck should I know?"
"Yes," Uryū said. "Somehow."
"I wish Szayelaporro could do that," the little arrancar said. "Someone definitely could've gotten Aaroniero or Yammy to drink him. No, each drink half of him!"
"Ewwwww," said the sleeve arrancar. "…Would that count as eating him or not? If it didn't kill him?"
"Eating part of him… Would he have gotten it back?"
"How?"
The increasingly grotesque discussion continued until they arrived in a lobby where Akon was waiting with seven fairly weak researcher-shinigami — he recognized Hanatarō's acquaintance, but none of the others — and a dolly of equipment. The arrancar made no objection to their falling in behind the group, and then — then they were outside.
Hanatarō had been right, the castle was unmissable.
Five minutes later, they were making their way through Seireitei's labyrinthine streets being gawked at by a random assortment of shinigami and civilians, and he was starting to hope this might not be a trick.
He wasn't sure it wasn't a trick until Cirucci Sanderwicci showed up and started demanding a chance to take revenge for her defeat out of his hide. She really did not fit a Szayelaporro plan. The reassurance was more than worth the three lashes they let her give him.
He could have done without the passing out, though.
Coyote Starrk
He hadn't bothered telling Lilynette to stay out of trouble. There wasn't any point to it.
(And anyway, if she caused some sort of problem because he'd been called away to deal with some sort of issue he hadn't caused with the "pet" he hadn't asked for, somebody else deserved to have to deal with it.)
Starrk arrived in the throne room to find a… drama of some sort already in progress. Hachigen knelt white-knuckled and sweating, yoke active, but hardly anyone's attention was on him. The black-haired Visored girl was huddled in the middle of the floor, eyes alert but unseeing, groping at the air, smacking into the floor like she couldn't even feel it. Hinamori-fukutaichō was standing by, chalk-white. A shinigami prisoner was kneeling in the shadows beside the throne. And Harribel was standing in the doorway, vibrating.
"Starrk," Aizen said. "I was going to send for you later. What brings you here?"
"Sorry to interrupt, Aizen-sama," he said. (Truthfully, since walking into the middle of this was so not on his list of good ways to spend an afternoon. Or morning. Or any time ever.) "I was getting some weird feedback from the yoke — I think it means Hachigen is running out of strength to safely obey the orders he's getting."
"I see," Aizen said, eyebrows raised. "Very well then, Hachigen-kun, you may release the orders and remove the yoke from Yadōmaru-kun."
Hachigen immediately sagged in place — the Visored girl gasped, and her eyes started tracking. When he started to get up, he swayed and went back to his knees. Shit. Was Starrk going to have to carry him?
Maybe not. "Lisa," Hachigen said in a low voice, "can you make it over here so I can take that yoke off?"
She could — half crawling, half scooting, never raising her eyes towards the throne. Hachigen put a hand over the yoke keystone at the back of her head and murmured what was probably an apology; she just shook her head and smiled faintly. She made a strangled noise when the yoke came off.
That was better. What sort of yoke was this? Who would want to use something which constantly sucked up the yoke holder's energy? Who could use it?
…Oh. He saw where this was going. Damn.
"Harribel," Aizen said, "you may re-yoke your pet, I have no further need of her at present."
Harribel didn't need to be told twice. She had crossed the room, reapplied the yoke, and picked up the girl even before she said, "Thank you, Aizen-sama. May I be excused?"
"You may," Aizen said magnanimously. "Hinamori-kun, you may be excused as well. I will summon you later."
"H-hai."
Starrk watched her flee the room. She'd seemed like a nice, cooperative person when she was working with Hachigen. He wasn't sure why Aizen was breaking someone already cooperating. None of his business, he guessed. "Are you done with Hachigen, Aizen-sama?" Aizen had mentioned wanting to see him, so… "If there were some Exequias to take him to my rooms here until we're done, he could recover some before we go back to Seireitei."
Aizen kindly granted him the use of some Exequias. Hachigen looked… possibly grateful. Happy to be leaving the throne room anyway.
"Take him to my rooms, make sure there's food and water," Starrk said. Then, to Hachigen himself, "Get some rest."
With that taken care of, he turned back to Aizen. "Aizen-sama?"
"Starrk," Aizen said. "I am going to instruct you in the use of a new, more specialized yoke."
He knew it.
"This more powerful yoke would not be practical for even most Espada to maintain, so I'm only calling for its use in a few particular cases." He indicated the prisoner kneeling off to the side.
It was the pink captain.
This was what passed for not too much trouble?!
Kyōraku Shunsui
The Primera looked openly dismayed. Shunsui wasn't sure whether he felt insulted or flattered. Maybe both.
"It is true that Shunsui-kun is inclined to be… naughty," Aizen said. Naughty? "However, restricting him from seeing, hearing, or communicating with shinigami should minimize the risk and make him quite manageable."
The Primera did not look convinced. He just looked depressed.
So that was the point of that show — that and punishing Lisa for whatever game of Aizen's she'd spoiled. Shunsui's mind raced. Not being able to communicate would be bad. Not being able to observe would be worse. Well, shit. At least the Primera was probably unlikely to always do the apparently energy-intensive sensory deprivation…
"This will take some practice to perfect, so you're going to start working on it today, as soon as I've completed a compressed version."
"Hai, Aizen-sama," the Primera said glumly.
Shunsui licked dry lips. "Nothing against you, Primera-san, but I think I might actually prefer the proving ground to losing my senses, such as they are."
"I thought you might say that," Aizen said. "If you do not cooperate, I will give Jūshirō's yoke to Aaroniero."
The Primera's eyebrows went up.
"And… who might Aaroniero be?" Shunsui asked.
"He should be here shortly," Aizen said. "Starrk, how would you describe him?"
"Um… The Novena Espada. He's a…" Starrk trailed off. "The relevant part is probably that he ate some weird Hollow who ate — no, absorbed — some shinigami and now he can change shape into him. The shinigami. And apparently he's gotten weird about it." He glanced at Aizen. "Sorry, Aizen-sama."
No. Shit.
"No, I asked," Aizen said. "Out of curiosity, where did you hear that?"
"Well, Lilynette… Grimmjow's fraccion, maybe? Grimmjow thought the whole thing was kind of weird. And I heard — from Zommari — Aaroniero tried to get Tōsen-sama to let him do shinigami administrative stuff."
"Ah, yes, I see from Shunsui's face that the surprise is spoiled. Still, may as well get to know him. Aaroniero?"
Just as Shunsui feared, the arrancar who entered had Shiba Kaien's face. And voice. And the reiatsu wasn't an exact match — how could it be? — but the general feel was still there. Shunsui tuned out the ranting, which didn't seem to make much sense anyway, but—
This — this might break Jū.
He bowed his head. "Very well, Aizen-sama. If it keeps Ukitake away from… that, I'll cooperate."
Aaroniero made a high-pitched outraged noise. "But I wanted the get the captain! After Grimmjow stole—"
"Dismissed, Aaroniero."
It took three tries to get his reiatsu not to throw the yoke off. It took the Primera four tries to order away sight. More practice was needed.
Shunsui ended up not going back to the proving ground for the rest of the day, but it was cold comfort.